


Temporal Cartography

by libraryphiliac



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: ?????????????????, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Cheating, M/M, Marauders' Era, Vignette, but there, oh my god i am Disgusted w myself, possible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-26
Updated: 2016-04-26
Packaged: 2018-06-04 15:59:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6665020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/libraryphiliac/pseuds/libraryphiliac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years, five scenarios, five emotions in Remus Lupin's life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Temporal Cartography

**Author's Note:**

> HALLO so hi I'm taking a fanfiction class in uni this semester and one of our assignments was to write/create fanfiction for the fandom of your choice! Obviously I chose Harry Potter. Obviously I chose the Marauders. Obviously I chose Mssr Moony.
> 
> (There were some restrictions on the length of the fic, so I had to cut down on each vignette (less than five hundred words each only!), but if/when I have the time/motivation, I will probably expound on some of these scenarios. God help me.)
> 
> None of these characters, nor the world they originally operated in, are mine.

** _I. June 1978_ **

Remus is graduating today. He is currently sat between Peter and Sirius, who is beside James who is beside Lily, while the ceremony is being held on the grounds next to the Lake. As it is, Sirius and James have been giggling like idiotic pre-teen boys who've been best friends for all of a week, and Remus’s right eye has been twitching since he heard the first snort erupt from next to his shoulder. He’s not going to let them get him to cause a scene, though. He, Remus Lupin, Gryffindor, Marauder, prefect, and werewolf, is _graduating from seven years of Hogwarts education today_.

In front of them, Albus Dumbledore is speaking at a podium on top of a makeshift stage crafted just this morning. The rest of their professors are seated in a row behind him, their expressions varying from of pride, happiness, mild horror, and bland, bored appreciation for this batch of graduates sitting like fresh-faced birds waiting for the next adult to arrive and start feeding th––

Another giggle. Remus’s hand spasms, and suddenly a hissed intake of breath sounds through Sirius’s teeth – a product of the pain caused by the flesh of his thigh being twisted between long fingers. “Will you _stop_ ,” Remus hisses back. “Dumbledore’s… _twinkling_ at us again.”

Sirius’ face turns smug, but he dutifully shuts up. Mercifully, James does so as well, after a few well-placed hits from Lily on his other side. Peter sighs, but even that sounds fond.

Later, when all five of them are sitting in the boat enchanted to take them across the Lake away from the castle, Remus feels fingers lacing through his, an arm wrapping around his waist, a chin hooking over his shoulder, a voice whispering in his ear.

“Happy graduation. I’m happy I got to spend my seven years with you, Moony.”

Remus smiles. He is content.

 

 

** _II. March 1979_ **

Remus is nineteen today. He is not expecting much, what with The War looming over their heads like a really gloomy cloud of impending Doom and Violence, but he had been woken up rather fantastically, thanks to Sirius, his mouth, and his rapidly improving cooking skills, and he and James have been hinting at a celebration for _ages_ and have even managed to sweeten it with the promise of completion with Peter attending, so it is a bit forgivable if Remus allows himself to raise his hopes, even only just a little. 

Also. “It’s not everyday our resident threadbare werewolf turns nineteen,” Sirius says reasonably, munching on the enormous chocolate bar he had given Remus as a gift. “One step closer to being twenteen, one step closer to your physical age matching your mental age of seventy-two, oh the _horror_ …”

Remus laughs in response. “Twenteen isn’t a word, Sirius.”

“Well, if Tolkien can invent ‘eleventy-one’ I can use twen – oh, no.”

Remus turns to check what has made Sirius’ voice switch from relaxed bantering to cold tightness, and hears the flapping of wings before he sees the owl. The smile slips from his face; his posture straightens out and he squares his jaw. The sudden silence in the kitchen is deafening. 

Sirius lets the owl in, takes the envelope from its beak, and sends it back on its way with a piece of bacon. They don’t need to check who the letter is from — the unmarked seal, dark red and foreboding in the bright morning light, is enough. 

“It’s addressed to you,” Sirius says quietly. He hands the letter over, and Remus takes it, opens it quickly, methodically, only the slight tremble in his fingers when he takes the folded parchment out betraying his apparent calm.

_It’s my mother_ , he thinks. _Or my father. Or both. Both are dead._

In the moment before his eyes start taking in the words in front of him, Remus is utterly, utterly terrified.

 

** _III. December 1980_ **

It’s Christmas Eve, and Remus is freezing. He had chosen to keep a little away from the main pack, huddled around the fire and around each other for heat, and Remus had had reasons — most packs don’t like wizards, most packs distrust those of their kind that live _among_ wizards —but right now, with the tip of his nose in danger of freezing off his face, he’s having trouble keeping to them.

_Christmas Eve_ , he thinks bitterly, _and I’m out here in the middle of nowhere trying to convince my own kind over to our side, when I know very well that this group won’t. They’re too weak, too small to ensure any kind of victory, and a good pack leader always puts the safety of his pack first. The instinct for self-preservation is, after all, how one survives in the wild._

His thoughts turn, invariably, to his friends. _Self-preservation. Hah._ My _pack has no lick of that. Sirius and James, always jumping off into dangerous situations… Me, enabling them… It’s a wonder we’re all still alive_.

Remus’s stomach clenches. _Bad choice of words there, Lupin._ The War never lets you forget about it, and he’s missed far too many funerals already. 

_Harry’s first Christmas, and I don’t even get to be there._

_No wonder James and Lily didn’t even consider making you a godfather_ , a voice whispers in his mind. _The kid’s better off with just Sirius, and James and Lily and Peter._ You’re _not good for him. You’re a_ werewolf. _They don’t miss you at all. Sirius doesn’t even send you letters anymore._

He can feel his face twisting even as he tries to shut off his thoughts. He knows it's not true, it's for safety, and for the War, and he should be grateful the Order is even letting him be of help — but he can't help but be resentful either way. Sirius's last letter was almost a month ago now,  and his tone had been almost… cold. Perfunctory. A passing remark that James and Lily were fine, no mention of Peter, no mention of Harry.  _He hasn't mentioned_  Harry, _for Christ's sake. If that's not indicative of anything, well…_

Remus shivers. He knows there is a spy in the Order. He doesn’t want to think about how close to home this spy might be

He’s startled from his thoughts by a light tap on his shoulder. He looks up. Ah. 

“Hello.” The man before him is the leader of the pack. “Aren’t you cold?” He brushes off the snow that has settled on the log Remus is siting on and settles beside him. “Here, have some tea,” he says, producing a thermos from within his coat. His eyes are a strange amber colour, almost yellow, but they are kind, and Remus is cold, so he says “Thank you” and takes the thermos into his hands.

When he looks up, the leader is still watching him. 

“Um,” he says intelligently. “Yes?”

“Do you want to come inside?” The grin that accompanies his question seems almost magnetic. “It’s much warmer there.”

And the thing is, Remus can pretend this is something else, but he’s cold, away from home on Christmas, fighting on what seems more and more to be like the losing side. He needs a reminder of what warmth feels like. However temporary, however false. And even when Sirius’s face flashes in his mind, he shoves it down, remembers the bitter possibility of betrayal, pastes a shallow, crooked smile on his face, and follows the man into his tent.

War changes all.

 

**_IV. November 1981_ **

It is the afternoon of November 1st, and Remus is dreaming. 

In his dreams, he is back in Hogwarts, not renting a dingy room in a sketchy pub in the anal parts somewhere up north, trying to convince some circles of goblins to switch up sides. No, in his dreams, Remus is in the Great Hall, eating breakfast while James and Sirius regale Peter and their other classmates with another successful prank last night. Remus was there too, keeping watch on the newly-finished Map in case anyone came around, but although his involvement in his friends’ pranks was never a real secret, he still prefers for it not be broadcasted to the student body the way James and Sirius broadcast theirs. 

_This is nice_ , Remus thinks, chewing on his toast, the strange duality of being in a dream and knowing one is dreaming casting a hazy net on his thoughts. _James is James, Sirius is Sirius, Peter is Peter, even Lily is here, glaring at us from a few seats over. I remember this. This is nice_. Distantly, he is grateful for his subconscious bringing him this small piece of familiarity. _Any second now Lily is going to slam her hand down on the table and_ —

_Tap._

Remus blinks, slowly. Lily is stalking over to James while he quickly tries to fix his hair, but Remus, who had been expecting a loud wooden bang, looks hazily around, disconcerted by the soft sound. He blinks again, and now Sirius is beside James, smirking winningly at Lily. Any moment now and Lily is going to turn to him, Remus, and — 

_Tap. Tap tap tap._

_“— ly Prophet!”_ a voice is shouting tinnily. _“The Daily Prophet! Special edition, sir! Pardon the rudeness!”_

Remus wakes. Someone is knocking lightly on his door. _Merlin. So much for the promise of undisturbed comfort._

He gets up, swipes a few Knuts off the bedside table to pay the owner for the paper, and closes the door with a loud creak. He sighs, wiping his face. The paper rustles in his hands. _How strange. Special edition? What could this be ab–_

Later, when the funerals and the memorial services are over, Remus will remember his dream in the permanent nightmare that his life had become, and will wonder if that was a warning. 

Now, however, all that registers is the numbness, the ice in his veins and the hatred in his blood, and the pure, unescapable knowledge that all his fears have been realised and that he is finally alone.

 

 

** _V. May/June 1993_ **

Remus is running. He can hear Hermione screaming upstairs, he’s running as fast as he can, _he’s here, he’s here, he’s alive…_

He bursts into the room, quickly taking in the situation – Harry, Hermione, Ron, his leg mangled and the scent of his blood staining the air. The boy is clutching at both his leg and his rat, and that leg is certainly something to look at, but at this very moment Remus couldn’t care less, because there, lying crumpled and bleeding on the floor in front of Harry, was Sirius Black.

He clamps down on his emotions and quickly disarms everyone in the room. The sight of Peter’s name on the Map is still seared into his mind’s eye.

“Where is he, Sirius?” His voice doesn’t break. Sirius’s face is blank as he raises a finger to point at the rat in Ron’s hand. 

_What?_ “But then… why hasn’t he shown himself before now?” _Think, think, think…_ “Unless —” _Ah._ “Unless he was the one… unless you switched…” _Don’t falter, don’t break._ “…without telling me?” 

Something in Sirius’s emotionless eyes splinters at the question, and Remus supposes, in a vague, indistinct sort of manner, that he was unable to get the slight bitterness completely out of his voice. Sirius nods. 

A pause, and then suddenly – Remus has no memory of moving – the only thing that matters now is that _Sirius is in his arms_. The body he is holding feels nothing like he remembers, too thin, abused and malnourished and filthy, but Sirius is clutching him back, stuttering breaths and incoherent phrases sounding in his ears, and Remus holds him like he’s never letting go.

It’s the first time in twelve years Remus has ever felt truly _alive_.


End file.
